1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to gardening equipment such as lawn mowers.
More particularly, the invention relates to an attachment that is added to an existing rotary lawn mower, which attachment is adapted to receive a hose for cleaning the lawn mower blade and underside surface of the lawn mower blade carriage.
2. Description of Prior Art
A large percentage of people today own their own lawn mowers. That fact, coupled with a do-it-yourself attitude, causes home owners to do most of the cleaning and repair of their own gardening devices. Among such equipment, rotary lawn mowers--particularly the mulching type--are difficult to keep clean.
In the standard home-sized rotary lawn mower a motor is mounted atop a blade carriage that has a downward depending skirt that is open primarily at the bottom and at a clipping exit point in the skirt. That carriage, including the downward depending skirt, houses the mower's rotating blade and offers both user protection from thrown articles hit by the blade, and also serves to contain the clippings of cut grass and direct them to the clipping exit port.
During use, the underside of the carriage, skirt section, blade, bearing housing and clipping port, becomes caked with a glue-like mixture. This mixture is formed from moisture, grass juice, sap, grass particles and small-sized clippings. Unless removed, this mixture, seriously reduces operational efficiency, gums the blades rotational capability, corrodes and otherwise rusts the mower carriage, blade and related mower components.
This invention provides an easily installed attachment for the skirt of the mower carriage which provides a simple and convenient way of quickly cleaning the mower via a connection to a common garden hose. The attachment does not require any special adaptations to the mower, is easily installed and is safe and efficient in operation.
A search of the prior art has revealed that hose-fed mower cleaning devices, in general, are well known. Such devices generally admit water through a hose into the carriage at a location above the rotary blade. A typical device is described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,027,590 issued on Jul. 2, 1991 to Stark.
The Stark device discloses a front-mounted device that requires a hole to be drilled in the front of the depending skirt. Stark also discloses a quick disconnect as an easy way of attaching a garden hose to the cleaning port assembly. It is Stark's contention, in keeping with this prior art disclosure, that water from the hose should be shot directly into the carriage at a position above the rotary blade. That water then is deflected down on the upper surface of the blade, and the resulting spraying tends to wash the mower unit.
U.S. Pat. No. to Gotti, 3,040,990 and Blume U.S. Pat. No. 2,936,563 also teach use of water streams above the blade from either the side or back of the carriage, respectively. Gotti is a straight-edged device with a plurality of nozzles located above the blade and Blume requires a hole to be drilled in the side of the carriage skirt to receive a straight through barrel portion for attachment to a hose.
Other classes of related art devices and additional patents are described in the description of the Stark, Gotti and Blume patents. Most such art reveals that various configurations of mower cleaning approaches are complex, require mower adaptation and in general are not satisfactory for most home owners.
Typical of such configurations is the U.S. Pat. No. 3,535,862 to Wittwer, issued on Oct. 27, 1970. The Wittwer patent shows a top-mounted eye-cup connection seated through a hole in the top of a mower casing for receiving a pressure nozzle from a garden hose. Spring loaded pressure relief plates direct the water in various patterns that are formed above the rotating blade.
Another patent to Griffin, U.S. Pat. No. 3,214,893 issued Nov. 2, 1965 has a circular top-mounted hose bib that feeds a spaced equidistant plurality of jet fixtures which are located under the top of the carriage portion and above the rotating blade. In a Stabnau U.S. Pat. No. 2,992,524 issued Jul. 18, 1961, a single top-mounted hose bib connects to another jet/sprinkler unit also located above the blade. Again the water is directed above the blade and the purpose, according to Stabnau is to form a "fine mist, which is directed with great force and velocity within the housing." Applicant, however, forms a reduced cross section jet stream directed upward and from beneath the rotating blade tips in order to form a pulsating cleaning action not heretofor taught or suggested by the prior art.
Keating U.S. Pat. No. 3,813,190 and Lund U.S. Pat. No. 4,784,327 also relate to mowers and cleaning or pumping devices. These additional patents are cited only for completeness sake, since the above-described patents adequately set forth the state of the known art.
The inventor has determined that none of the known prior art provides a curved attachment with a depending slot in the upper edge allowing a novel cleaning attachment to be fitted to the skirt with a water passageway located solely below the slot termination, which passageway forms a jet stream that is directed upward and from beneath a rotating blade for an improved pulsating cleaning action. Entrance for hose-fed water is straight in at essentially a horizontal direction toward the mower housing, and is then angled upward as a jet stream of water into the blade tips proper for a pulsating cleaning action.